Colors change when you copy objects from one publication to another in Publisher 2007 and in Publisher 2003

When you copy objects from one publication and then paste them in another publication, the color of the borders, fills, or text in those objects may change.

The behavior occurs because the objects are set to follow the first publication's color scheme; the second publication does not use the same color scheme.

Before you copy the objects from the first publication, follow these steps:

1. On the Tools menu, point to Commercial Printing Tools, and then click Color Printing.
2. Click the Colors tab.
3. Look for color names on the list that have a format similar to one of these, where n represents a numeric value between 0 and 255.
   • Main (Color Name) -- RGB (n, n, n)
   • Main (Color Name) -- CMYK (n, n, n, n)
   • Accent n (Color Name) -- RGB (n, n, n)
   • Accent n (Color Name) -- CMYK (n, n, n, n)
   • Accent n (RGB (n, n, n))
   • Accent n (CMYK (n, n, n, n))
4. For each of these colors, follow these steps:
   1. Click the down arrow next to the color swatch, and then click Change.
   2. Click the Custom tab.
   3. Click OK.
   The color name will change to one of the following formats: RGB (n, n, n) or CMYK (n, n, n, n). If the original color was Accent 1 (CMYK (n, n, n, n)), the color will now be named CMYK (n, n, n, n) after you follow this step.
5. After you have changed all the colors, click OK.

After you follow these steps, you can copy objects from this publication and then paste them in another; the objects will retain their original colors.

This is not a problem with Microsoft Publisher; this is the way Publisher is designed to work. Publisher has a feature named Color Schemes. Each color scheme is made up of a Main color, five Accent colors, a Hyperlink color, and a Followed Hyperlink color. If you assign an object’s border, fill, or text colors to follow one of these color schemes, those objects change color you copy them from one publication to another. The objects take on the color appropriate to the new publication’s color scheme. With this feature, you can copy content between publications and have that content maintain a consistent look.

Sometimes you do not want those objects to follow the color schemes. In that case, you must replace the scheme colors with custom colors of the same value. The procedure listed in the "Resolution" section of this article does this.